10 Hurt During White Supremacist Rally

At least 10 people were injured, some with critical stab wounds Sunday afternoon after a protest by white supremacists turned violent on the lawn of the California Capitol.

Sacramento Fire Department said nine men and one woman were injured. Five patients were transported to area hospitals from the melee with stab wounds. At least two had life-threatening injuries. Others had cuts.

The Traditionalist Working Party held a permitted rally at the Capitol and about 30 people began demonstrating. The group was met by about 400 "anti-fascist" counter-protesters. The groups began fighting on the Capitol lawn just before noon.

Matthew Heimbach, chairman of the Traditionalist Worker Party, told the Los Angeles Times that his group and the Golden State Skinheads organized the Sunday rally. Heimbach said that in the clash, one of their marchers had been stabbed in an artery and six of the counter-protesters had also been stabbed.

According to its website, the Traditionalist Worker Party believes "European-American identity is under constant attack."

The party writes on its website that "American popular culture offers examples of perverse behaviour that mean to destroy European-American families, leaving us unable to secure our own future as a race."

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups, said the TWP, formed in 2015, is the political wing of the Traditionalist Youth Network, which "aims to indoctrinate high school and college students into white nationalism."